Disco (Still) Isn't Dead

How Todd Terje made the cheesy sounds of old porno scores into one of the most beloved albums of the year

Lately people have been flipping out quite seriously over possibly the most un-serious record to be released so far this year. It's Album Time, by Norwegian producer and DJ Todd Terje, came out over a month ago, and as the title and album art (a vivid retro-mod cartoon portrait of the maestro posed faux-wistfully in front of a piano) suggest, it's a giddy, unabashedly fun record. Terje wants to move listeners' bodies, but he's more concerned with making them smile, and his music ends up somewhere between dance and the "Mahna Mahna" song from the Muppets. (And probably closer to the latter.) It may seem jokey, but the album's already turning up on many best-of lists from musical tastemakers, including the one that Questlove recently gave us.

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Terje's fascinated by shiny, cheerful old sounds, especially ones that were long ago relegated to the status of kitsch. It's Album Time is packed with stylistic nods to corny psychedelic jazz-pop, '80s shutter-shade Italo disco, and the lounge music, Tropicália, and bossa nova that soundtracked cocktail parties in the Mad Men era. He seems to have a particular affinity for library music, particularly from the '60s and '70s, that was specifically made to be licensed for TV and film projects that didn't have the budget for original scores, and which has since become a subject of obsession for a particular kind of record geek. His extensive catalog of unofficial remixes includes tracks by uncool bands like the Turtles and the Osmonds.

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While Terje mines pop culture's extensive kitsch reserves for raw material, he never treats it with disdain. It's Album Time, like his past work, is utterly devoid of irony. Even when he's working with thoroughly cheese-infused influences, it never comes off in a mocking way — he has the rare ability to reference '70s European porno music (through the syrupy strings and burbling synthesizers of "Preben Goes to Acapulco") without a wink. In this respect, he has a lot in common with Beck, who's spent his entire career elevating detritus from thrift-store record bins into something approaching high art.

The mishmash of styles and sounds on Terje's records defies categorization, so people have invented a new one to file it under: space disco. Disco frequently figures into Terje's music, making him one of a number of people currently working to revive the style. LCD Soundsystem mastermind James Murphy, for instance, has spent years digging up lost gems from the disco era, and introducing new listeners to a harder-edged underground sound that's the polar opposite of the polished Bee Gees and Village People stuff that most people associate with the genre, and even rock-oriented bands like Arcade Fire have joined in the effort. But while Murphy and his followers represent a sound that's rawer than most people knew the style could get, Terje's all about the genre's most overwrought, even bloated moments, the "Star Wars Disco" to Murphy's lean Chic groove.

A lot of Terje's early adopters have been a certain kind of close listener excited by unknotting the dense web of stylistic references that he's created, but as with Beck in his early days, his growing popularity is being propelled by far more than the sum of his musical mixing and matching. Getting into It's Album Time doesn't require reams of knowledge about obscure moments in pop music history. All you need to do is put it on, open your ears, and let yourself get on Terje's happy level.